Model protestors lead small-scale action

Campaigning teenagers with a big gripe launched a model protest after being charged adult prices for admission to tourist attractions across the Cotswolds.

They created a set of tiny figures carrying banners and photographed them in front of miniature shops and churches at the renowned Model Village in Bourton on the Water.

The banners included joking references to the scale of the problem, including, “costing kids a small fortune” and “not a small issue.” Two other figures carried banners saying: “What do we want? Fair fares for under-18s.” “When do we want it? Before we’re 18!”

The Model Village, a one ninth scale replica of the picturesque village of Bourton on the Water, attracts tourists from all over the world but charges adult prices from the age of 14 upwards.

The national Childfare campaign was launched by teenagers a year ago, soon after a change in the law came into effect requiring all children to remain in education until the age of 18.

Emily Stott, 17, co-founder of the campaign, which is calling for child prices on attractions and transport to apply to the age 18, said: “The model village is a place we’ve loved for many years as a family and though the difference in cost between an adult and a child ticket is very little, we’d love them to change their pricing.
“This was a small protest – literally – but the problem is big. We could only find one attraction in the Cotswolds that charges child pricing to the age of 18 – that’s the Westonbirt Arboretum near Tetbury.

“In the eyes of the law we’re children till the age of 18 but the concept of charging adult prices at 16 and upwards comes from an era when mst children left school when they’d finished GCSEs or O-levels. Tourist attractions and bus and rail companies don’t seem to have noticed we are now studying to 18 and aren’t able to earn adult wages. It’s not just that we haven’t the time, the minimum-wage for those under-18s who do have part-time jobs is nearly half the minimum wage for most adults.”